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\centerline{\bigscrew Sand River Journal}
\bigskip
\centerline{Edited by Erik Asphaug}
\centerline{(asphaug@lpl.arizona.edu)}
\vskip 0.4truein
\centerline{\screwball Issue 2, May 10 1993}
\vskip 0.2in
\centerline{\vbox{\hrule width2.5in depth1pt}}
\vskip 0.3in
\centerline {This issue of Sand River is dedicated}
\centerline {to my grandmother Amanda Mjelde}
\centerline {who is 100 years old today.}
\vskip 0.3in}
\bigskip

\obeylines

\def\title#1{\vskip 0.8in\bigskip\bigbreak\hskip 3em {\goofy #1}\bigskip\nobreak}

\def\author#1#2{\nobreak\medskip\line{\hskip 1.5truein\hbox{\sl #1\/}\hfill}%
\line{\hskip 1.5truein\hbox{\lsl #2}\hfill}\goodbreak}

\hoffset=1.6in

\title{ the girl in the corner with the brightest smile}

She paints herself that bird, a thrush
with crimson stain across her mouth
No cardinal, a hot-sweet flush
belies the fever flocking south.

\author{Manish Vij}{uclink.berkeley.edu}

\title{Famine}

Not ort, nor crumb, nor kindness,
fell from my father's table.
A lifetime after his passing
I nurse a swollen emptiness
that scraps will never fill.
\medskip
My children's eyes brim
with that self same hollow.
I hear it in their famished tones
and sparing voices.
They too will sing this song.

\author{Albert McClure}{Albert\_McClure@mindlink.bc.ca}

\title{Asclepius}

What is it that dreams
\qquad \& brings these unused lives
\qquad\qquad into our own?
\qquad\qquad\qquad  Memories that never were -
\qquad\qquad\qquad  Lovers that never will be.
\qquad\qquad Who stands at the gates
\qquad of these pleasing escapes
cabalistic behind hushed eyes,
\qquad waiting for the curtain of our
\qquad\qquad silent lives to rise?

\author{Alex L. Mauldin}{mauldin@lonestar.utsa.edu}

\title{A Poem}

Quicksilver Dreams of Mercury-
Defying time in Ways forgot.
I sat by the Pear tree, your Tear Tree-
The Blossoms are free, the Fruit is not.
\medskip
White wing\'ed Swans in wating
In many a mirrored Tarn.
The mystic {\it Mirrage} abating---
A strangly enchanted Yarn...
\medskip
The twin Tower of Paradise
Are hidden from our Eyes-
But we can se a Land of Lies
Of Dreams and dark Demise

\author{Oren Bochman}{x67107@barilvm.biu.ac.il}

\title{Hospital Gardens}

Dazed by the unremembered sun,
avoiding eyes, like men in sex shops,
they stand engaged in confusion
not looking back at the home
where they have sat around the fire
all winter, sagging like Brie.
They only know it from the inside,
and the garden from the window.
\medskip
The nurses find a box of tennis balls
and offer them around like canapes.
Balls fly to and fro, stitch up the air. 
Suddenly, under their perfect parabolas, 
laughter breaks out. When the bell goes, 
the patients are led back along the path, 
not one glancing over their shoulders
at the balls abandoned in the grass.
\bigskip
This is the freedom targeted at the feeble minded,
those most sane when telling of their madness,
broken into once too often. Uninsurable,
exhausted, they are dispersed for their own good,
slipping under the cold blankets of deceit
to let their own sweat warm them
in these, the first days of summer. 

\author{Tim Love}{tpl@eng.cam.ac.uk}

\title{Snail Tale}

Home is where the heart is, so they say;
for those of us who have no heart
\quad  to speak of, anyway,
cannot be dispossessed, this loneliness
is carried with us 'til our dying day.
\medskip
A place to call my own will never be
more than a house --- a home
\quad  is where the lonely
slowly die: they hide from what they keep inside,
and I can't run away from me.
\medskip
Then call me a human counterpart to snail:
I carry all I need upon my back
\quad  and leave a sticky trail
of leaking substance from my presence ---
write a story from my tail.
\medskip
The only place to hide's within the shell
I call my home - it serves its dual
\quad  purpose just as well,
and all so dispossessed are doubly blessed
with a sanctity and a personal hell.
\medskip
This temporary residence will do
'til alterations to my permanent
\quad  resting place are through,
so I can reside with my fear inside
while the world builds a dreamhouse for you.

\author{Jenna Laughton}{s8701876@macgraw.mqcs.mq.oz.au}

\title{Red-Headed In Chainmail}

There are still Ashes
in the front shipyard-
from the distant stars.
A little redhead sobbing,
her eyes not understanding,
still searching
for that Mother.

There was an ambulance
carrying her brother away,
The lassgan chared flesh
with clamps on the depressurised skin
of hir wrists.

The siren was a screaming cat,
fur scorched...

My hands like doves
asking to offer peace
to the little girl's heart.

They came up empty,
ash black.

\author{Oren Bochman}{X67107@vm.biu.ac.il}

\title{After the storm}

Walking the beach this morning
last night a huge storm
and I find a brassiere bobbing into shore
one cup small
one cup large.
She must have been
a Picasso
lost at sea.

\author{Ralph Cherubini}{ralph@wixer.bga.com}

\title{A planetary source for daydreams}

When the old people gather round the bingo cards,
They find the treasures missed in youth,
\medskip
What sacrifices do the young think they have given,
Which could not be ignored or replaced with dismal stones? 
\medskip
The anguish and fears of my forefathers dreading long,
Were wasted years and gladly forgotten by others,
\medskip
What we need is,
A planetary source for day dreams.

\author{Kenneth Tolman}{tolman@cs.utah.edu}

\title{the visit}

you'll love them, you promised me
\medskip
dinner was impeccable
except for the do-si-do conversations
of who is whom \dots from where am i
and wherefore am i going
have you ever \dots have you been \dots
oh dear, what if \dots
as silent blue lasers pared me to the bone
in paper thin layers
except for my chilled umber eyes
cresting at flood stage.

\author{Zita Marie Evensen}{bu016@cleveland.Freenet.Edu} 

\title{In death, there is a fragile breath \dots}

in death, there is a fragile breath,
blown from a baby's glass rattle, still
and surrounding. \quad  before it comes, it tinkles,
cold as marble and elegant, patterned with
the busts of soldiers and sculptors past while
dangling the keys to the forbidden doors of fruit.
there is no calm in death's company of gremlinic demons: 
frustration, love, pain, security, grief, agitation, bliss \dots
these catalysts of piagetian circular reactions -- they
hound and harass, cattleherd, in a box the size
of a coin, in a windowless ant farm.  this is the universe to
them. \quad  to us, it is an infinite point of
motion in a finite world of silence.  

\qquad  a brazen piece of copper falls into a black
ravine, twirling and shining in its long tumble.

\author{Jennifer Crystal Fang-Chien}{jchien@leland.Stanford.EDU}

\title{I Am a Garotee:}

And Walk like one down to the brothel
by the coblestone, I the skeptic, turn
into the flesh of beastality,
fly-ridden by the chemistry of death
I take my boats as if I deserve;
power is only a concidence of incarnation.
Does red tape not exist beyond burocracy?
Are the forests no less ravaged sweet
than are my garote?
\medskip
I a garotee
and wait fot the complete violation of some higher species
who will surely come,
with a language that renders me mute
as brazen as the industries of darkness
and will hump me like arabs hump the earth for hidden fuel,
In my stupid mammal expressions
which convey no more than I am a bloat.

\author{James Forgy}{james@clam.com}

\title{tango}

the tango, she told me,
is a sad thought which can be danced
and dance we did,
\medskip
donning a false arrogance,
a flashingly bold detachment
we held cool eyes and hands
and I tried to feel, to find
some dampness in our
casual synapse that might
soak this sadness to me.
\medskip
This soft grief takes two
into mirrored lines and curves
with its peculiar comedy
I said with a sigh, a smirk
she too echoed somehow with
crystal eyes the two-ness
of this feeling, the wist
of being one alone together
dancing to the strange laments
of velvet paintings.

\author{Corwin D. Shackelford}{cdshacke@david.wheaton.edu}

\title{We speak}
 
We speak the language of fingers and lips
of a flower which opens into sweetness
and a creature which seeks out
dark holes.

\author{Ralph Cherubini}{ck621@cleveland.Freenet.Edu}

\title{How to Choose a Landscape}

It must be wide enough
to accommodate your shoulders.
Foxtail in the foreground,
as if the hills would roll the other way
if they caught you watching.
\medskip
Water you can't see,
though a skein of willows springs
from the loose threads 
in its hem.
Enough obscurity
that you can invent
what you can't define.
\medskip
An unnameable hour
in an unknown season.
One foot upon the high ground
and no intention of pulling it back.

\author{Mary C. McDaniel}{csmcm@ux1.cts.eiu.edu}

\title{cups}
  
coffee in this hour ? i have never..
what made me wake up ?
two cups forgotten, cooled and brimful. 
i tried sipping some but the cup slipped and
stained an umber ring on the tablecloth.
still i was left tending a lonesome cup
i did not wish to spill with shaky hands.
after closing time, chasing fantasies
with a dark ring around my heart.

\author{Eero Kankaanp}{ekankaan@kaira.hut.fi}

\title{World of My Own}

I feel safe and alone in a world of my own
where it never grows cloudy or grey,
all the bad things have gone and when dreaming is done
I can play in the sunshine all day.
\medskip
There are birds that can sing and I know everything
lives by brotherly love and with laughter,
each morning will bring butterflies on the wing
and it's peace in my world ever after.
\medskip
I can feel safe and warm in the eye of a storm
with the world around twisted and strange,
and I'll never be torn from that dream that was born
from a fear so there'll never be change.
\medskip
Wake me up in the morn so I face the new dawn
that still leaves me alone when my dreams are all gone.

\author{Jenna Laughton}{s8701876@macgraw.mqcs.mq.oz.au}

\title{Always different}
 
They always wanted her
different
everyone said ``She is wonderful. If only...''
and
after a while
all she heard was this ``If only...''
as if her directed evolution would save a life
prevent a catastrophe of world-wide proportions
and because she needed approval needed love
needed
she became a
chameleon
capable not only of greens and browns
but also of meekness and groveling
she became
eventually
anything one wished
and
in her final
last
moment
achieved that miracle of instant adaptation
which allowed her
to vanish entirely
which is what
everyone
had really wanted.

\author{Ralph Cherubini}{ck621@cleveland.Freenet.Edu}

\title{Swing Dance}

The softness of the skin
on the back of your neck
as you take my hand
and spin into my arms.
\medskip
I want to stop
and touch you in a different way.  
Brush your lips with mine.
Our eyes meet and lock
For just a second.
\medskip
You reach for me,
lay your hand on my hip, gently
and push me away.
\medskip
The music throbs
And the dance goes on.

\author{Deb Schwartz}{das@emmapeel.ca.boeing.com}

\title{The Tea-Party (at 4am)}

when the pressure got too much
the globe rolled helplessly and listed 
drunk and dizzy on bare shoulders
and all the shrieking demons and ideas and weirds
in acid-tartan romper suits, 
romped 
brave wild ceilidhs skirrling in her mind 
the doctors offered a new hope
implant a faucet at the brainstem
to drain away
irradiated liquid 
until the hurting stopped, and the lights turn grey again
and the sky a tea-green harbour
for the lemon sun and the lifeboat listed
like a train easing into Euston (gently)
she beat a short straight alpha trace
through bubble-chambered corridors to me.
'Talk to me, because I have just noticed
I have teeth instead of teeth'
and as usual we sip tea together
it burns the memory of sleep's kisses from my mouth
and keeps hands busy.
we watered poppy seeds with idea-ichor 
until
they grew large enough to bite
and swear and sing rude rugby songs
and fry her with embarrassment and basil
(and all the things she will not dare)
they are possessed, she joked,
then we will eat them (ever practical reply)
'fuck off you wankers' were their dying cries
we got high on poppy-corpses rolled with other weeds
just as well
as it is difficult to snort green tea.

\author{Joanna Hart}{jhart@ee.ic.ac.uk}

\title{The Only Way To Go}

Swimming to the surface
of a stifling slumber,
I crash through
waves of consciousness,
memories floating like driftwood
towards an intangible shore.
Reaching for the light,
I cannot make it that far,
so I grab
the bottle instead.
Fiery liquid in my lungs,
fighting for a breath
and going under once again,
oh God,
dragging me under,
my fingers clench, clawlike,
and then nothing
but a foamy silence.

\author{Michael}{mag@wam.umd.edu}

\title{A Poem for the Masses}
 
par crap
sweet loneliness back in my arms today
nothing can match this
wretching, reeked, fucking the way she is
\qquad far away
covered by shrouds of trust
 
\author{Anthony Townsend}{u96\_atownsen@vaxc.stevens-tech.edu}

\title{The Part that Hurts}

I wanted to hibernate 
without the threat of spring, just a catnap 
that creeps up like the clinging, 
of ivy to whitewash.
I thought of the last note on a rusty piano.
The fading would be 
\medskip
easy. Then I saw 
how a girl could struggle to think, could struggle to disappear. 
Those thoughts rebounded like slow motion light 
from a disco ball. Too quick for her to catch,they whizzed 
like the beat of a hummingbird's heart. 
``Remember me, forget me. Remember me,'' her eyes begged. 
She thought she saw
the people laugh as they bounce their way home. 
Her eyes asked how to laugh, when the world is wild. 
They close their eyes and live, Danielle. 
\medskip
I think about being in the womb: warm wet, beating.
Thrown screaming into bright air
and settled on a crib to close our eyes,
we feel the same dying.
We are teetering, one side underwater, on the other cold air.
We fall. This is the part that hurts.
Then, please, we are warm

\author{Elisabeth Amy Sylvan}{es4h+@andrew.cmu.edu}
 
\title{girl of three bicycles}
 
eight blocks from her place
joanna cranes her neck 
i instinctively slow down
--- that's my bike, she says.
\medskip
yellow ten-speed chained in the night
by a flimsy red cable (in chicago?)
to a no parking sign.
\medskip
well, what do you want to do about it?
nothing.  i'll fetch it tomorrow.
\medskip
but i know her bike is blue.
i was shown it the last time.
\medskip
asiu, how many bikes do you have?
three.  but only one is mine.
\medskip
girl of three bicycles, girl of three bicycles,
girl of three bicycles.
 
\author{Marek Lugowski}{lugowski@ils.nwu.edu}
 
\title{They Blew Up the Pub}

They blew up the pub,and Doyle was in it.
Once, he waxed prophetic
in sobriety and died to
live his tale.
\medskip
Mary, mother of his three
children, prayed for the
souls of ``them that done it.''
One returned to his job at the bank,
the other to the counselling of disturbed children.

\author{Albert McClure}{Albert\_McClure@mindlink.bc.ca}

\title{Lisp}

lisp in 10
tears come hard
for hate in the mirror
sound transfixed between the scratches

\author{Matt Meyer}{satan@wpi.WPI.EDU}

\title{countenance}

would you like to see
the face of loneliness?
it has
\qquad no horizons.

\author{Zita Marie Evensen}{bu016@cleveland.Freenet.Edu}

\bye